Dandelion Greens--Umm, Er, Maybe Not

I've been thinking for a while about trying dandelion greens. I mean, what's not to like? They grow in our yard like crazy at this time of the year, so since I'm going to pull them up, anyway, we might as well eat them, too. There was so much advice about this all over the Internet that I decided to just ignore all of it and serve the greens raw in a salad.

I enlisted DS to get out the old Fiskars weedeater and rip a bunch of dandelion plants out by the roots. The websites all tell you that the big leaves can be bitter, so I carefully cut off only the small leaves for our salad. By the time DS got tired of yard work (about 15 minutes, I'd say), I had enough greens for the three of us. I chopped up a tomato to add to the "salad" and dished up three bowls of it.

DH tried gamely to eat it, but after one bite DS was through. You can see from the picture how much he didn't like it. Before I had even taken a seat at the counter they were both proclaiming the greens to be inedibly bitter. My first couple of bites were all right, but by bite #3 I was inclined to agree with them, so we picked out the tomatoes and unceremoniously dumped the greens in the trash.

Still, as I was walking outside this morning, I saw a whole fresh new crop of the telltale yellow flowers scattered on the lawn. Maybe I could collect a new bunch and try cooking them...